


Idée fixe

by nowstfucallicles



Category: Sherlock Holmes (1984 TV), Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle
Genre: First Kiss, Friends to Lovers, Friendship/Love, Granada Holmes, M/M, POV Sherlock Holmes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-30
Updated: 2016-08-30
Packaged: 2018-08-12 01:36:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,430
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7915390
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nowstfucallicles/pseuds/nowstfucallicles
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He does not know what to begin with it. It is too grave a thing to be treated as a mere distraction, too tenacious to be dissolved in tobacco smoke. What does one begin with an idée fixe? With a mind bent towards one single thing.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Idée fixe

**Author's Note:**

> Unbetaed.

He steps off the cab, glancing around him. Wagner is still alive in his ears, vibrant, his leitmotif echoing through the storm-swept Baker Street. A deserted, hazy stretch, with the glow of street lights just coming on. He does not wait for Watson but walks ahead on his own, hands clasped behind his back. He would be moved, on an evening like this. He would be satisfied, filled with music, if not for the one thought circling in his mind. The thought he should have discarded by now and which clings to him nonetheless as he steps into the unlit hallway.

There is a whiff of dried lavender and polish, lingering despite Mrs. Hudson’s short-lived absence. He has not been paying attention, it is simple as that. He has missed something crucial, has overlooked the thing growing in the shades until, unattended, it became impossible to ignore. He does not know what to begin with it. It is too grave a thing to be treated as a mere distraction, too tenacious to be dissolved in tobacco smoke. What does one begin with an idée fixe? With a mind bent towards one single thing. One single man. This man.

He heads upstairs, his fingers hurrying over the wormy railing. The lock on the front door snaps shut and there is the tap from Watson’s silk-bound hat. Holmes glances back, briefly catching his eye. It is not without chagrin, even though he knows Watson is blameless. The man did nothing to invite this, nothing to deserve it, either. Their life has been as always, the way it has been for years, in a well-honed equilibrium. In quiet, tepid waters. He looks Watson over from where he stands and there is a warm dryness in his throat. A sudden, familiar appetite. It does not show, yet it still courses through him in the blink of an eye. 

With a quiet sneer to himself, he turns away. Things of such nature, they belong on campus, like child’s play into the nursery. They belong in those stranger days of the past, belong with a susceptibility of character he was sure to have outgrown. He thought to have lost his taste for passion, to have exhausted whatever meaning it possessed to him. No matters of the heart, no hunger for another. For years, only the ebb and flow of his own thoughts. His mind’s work or at times the lack thereof. It might have gone on like that. And still, there it is. A mere suggestion, a whisper with the power of an imperative. 

He sees it in Watson, as if looking into a curved glass. Sees it inadvertently in a hundred small incidents, in the simplicity of a glance following him up the stairs. He has a need for Watson, a steady and relentless need he has accumulated over the years, a need he can account for. He knows it down to its very details, the same way he knows the man. Intimately, profoundly. What he does not need, what he can not account for, is the futile heat that passes back and forth between them of late, in their box, amidst the final cadence of an aria, in a mere London cab. 

He flings the door open, his hand reaching up to turn up the gas, then he thinks better of it. The light of day has just vanished, yet the summer has been unusually cool, leaving traces of damp warmth between the walls. A taste of mortar and rugs. He throws down his cape and leans back against the mantelpiece, closing his eyes. He can still hear that aria in his head. A poker to this insipid blaze. 

Watson’s steps enter soon after, crossing the room, and there is a light rustling of the blinds. The fine irregularity to Watson’s gait, he could pick it out on a marketplace. It belongs in these rooms, belongs with him, and for a moment his attention is carried away, drawn by a sudden inspiration. The room is quiet now, telling him that Watson is watching him. Watching him in the near-dark with that curiosity of his that never wears off. Always ready to be baffled, surprised.

Watson is at an arm’s length, standing by the empty firebox, and Holmes simply reaches out. He takes hold of his hand. That flat and unseemly appetite flares up in him, widens as he takes another breath. He wants to give in. Watson’s hand is like that of a sleeping man and Holmes presses it lightly, trying out what it does to him. It is mild, a stirring of passion. His eyes open, yet he will not look at Watson now. He lifts the hand and quickly puts it to his lips, feeling its fingers curl. The sign of a slight shock, one that should not last. 

There is the scent, however. Watson’s scent. Having grown strong over the day, layered with cedar oil from the gloves. Phenolic. It is by his side at all times, something he seldom notes and has never indulged before. He wants to follow it, to pick it up where it’s richer, sharper. He kisses Watson’s hand, truly kisses it this time. There is no mistaking it for anything else and as small a motion as it is, it plunges them into uncharted terrain. Watson’s hand twitches and Holmes holds on to it, his lips ghosting over the lower thumb, melting onto the patch that’s rough from writing.

“Holmes.” There is reproach and some disbelief in Watson’s voice but it is also soft, much softer than it should be. He is not going anywhere, even though he wants to. Holmes raises his head and takes a glance at him in the dim light, then he lets go of the hand. Slowly relinquishes it. The exasperation flickering over Watson’s face tells him what he already knows. This is neither harmless, nor will it be without consequence. He is overstepping, on a whim no less, on grounds of a false premise. Yet Watson’s hand never leaves him. With a curt caress it settles on the back of his head. The man rarely surprises him, rarely ever has. How extraordinary. How delicate, the way his fingers move into his hair. 

He does not move, still his pulse begins to pick up. There is something dreadful to the volatility of passion. Something elusive, despite all his powers. Watson leans forward, his breath catching in Holmes’s, and he hovers for a moment, right there. Irresistibly. The line of his lip. The tips of his moustache. His scent. He is waiting, Holmes realizes. And suddenly he takes joy, for the first time, a rash and fleeting joy in wanting the man. In the very intrusion of it, its monomanical force. He presses his lips to Watson’s, it is all he has to do. It is all it takes and he is being kissed, slowly, carefully, with the beginnings of an unexpected fervor. Pleasure sinks into his mark, a passing, pain-like feel. He lowers his head, tilts it, slides into the kiss like into a meditation. 

A biting taste, Watson’s, dry and malty, and his kiss is little like those he has known. A kiss without youth, one that makes him want to tear open his collar, to court it in all but graceless ways. A kiss that deserves to be wanted. To be had. Every tinge and shape of it, every muffled, swallowed sound. The wet rasp of Watson’s cheek against his own. The last of its taste is delicious to him. 

Watson’s grip tightens at last, pushing slowly to bring them apart. Holmes leans back. There are rumpled lapels and an unconcealed appetite, looking back at him. A different man, and for a moment the sight flattens him against the mantelpiece.

“Goodnight, Holmes.”

He swallows, wanting to steady his voice. To calm his breath, the heaving rhythm of his pulse, if only slightly. “Goodnight.”

There is a pause before Watson moves away, his brow wrinkled from thought. The door shuts quietly and Holmes remains, touching his lips. He is humming like a string, yet there is a peace about him he has not known of late. His thoughts are with Watson still, fixed on him still. They are bound to be. Tirelessly and exultantly so. He knows it as he listens to the stairs above, to the small sounds and motions, before sinking into his seat. He stretches out in the dark. That unlikely taste is still on his tongue. That scent still in his nostrils. He begins to contemplate.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! I love these two.....


End file.
